John F. Kennedy
Youree Choi
Election of kennedy
Election of 1960
Democratic Party with Lyndon B.Johnson as VP nominee
- Republican candidate with Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.
- Kennedy was framed because he was a Catholic
- Importance of Television : visual image impacted on debate results
Results
Kennedy won by 118,574 popular votes, 303 electoral votes
New Frontier: called upon the American people for sacrifices to achieve their potential greatness in his inaugural speech
Cold War
Soviets
More conciliatory approach : Proposal of Peace Corps (US skills to underdeveloped countries)
Kennedy met with Soviet premier Khrushchev at Vienna on June 1961
Khrushchev threatened to make treaty with East Germany and cut off western access to Berlin
Soviets started to construct the Berlin Wall in August 1961 to keep people in East Germany
Flexible Response
- spread of decolonization : "brushfire wars" and civil revolutions around the world
- pressures on American foreign policy increased
- Kennedy implemented the flexible response : variety of military options during times of crisis in order to prevent massive retaliation
- Increased spending on normal military forces and the special forces
Vietnam
- Unstable pro- western government in Saigon
sharp increase in the number of U.S. Troops in Vietnam
encouraged a successful coup against Diem
more than 15,000 American troops were in Asia by the time of his assassination
led to political disintegration
Cuba
Extended relationship through Alliance for Progress : to help underdeveloped neighboring countries to lessen the economic gap
Kennedy trained anti-communist exiles to invade Cuba at the Bay of Pigs to overthrow communist leader in Cuba ( Fidel Castro ) but was captured and failed
Cuban missile crisis : Khrushchev secretly built missile bases in Cuba
Caused a naval blockade of Cuba
Khrushchev agreed to pull the missiles while America agreed not to invade and rid of the blockade
Later revealed that Cuba had operational nuclear weapons that would have been released if attacked
Closest world has ever got to what could have been total nuclear war
Civil Rights
70 % of Kennedy's supporters were black
Political tensions delayed Kennedy to pass civil rights bills
Relationship between Martin Luther King Jr. : led the March on Washington in support
Congress was mainly Republican or Southern Democrat, making it hard to pass civil rights bills.
created the Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity (EEOC) to help end racial discrimination in the U.S. government
He called for new civil legislation to protect black citizens
Assasination
In Dallas on November 22, 1963
mortally wounded in the brains while riding in a motorcade
Lee Harvey Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby before standing trial.
The Warren Commission called to investigate Kennedy's death, found Oswald acted alone to kill Kennedy
Conspiracies still lasts today